People from across France came to Paris to let the president know how they feel about the taxes in general and the tax on diesel.
https://twitter.com/V_of_Europe/status/1066309354654244864
Police Use Tear Gas as Thousands in Paris Defy Protest Ban
The WSJ reports Police Use Tear Gas as Thousands in Paris Defy Protest Ban.
Violence erupted Saturday between police and several thousand demonstrators who defied a protest ban and marched down the famous Parisian avenue Champs Elysées, as the country’s interior minister blamed the far-right for the unrest in the French capital.
On the Champs Elysées, some protesters sang the national anthem and waved French flags, while others carried signs urging the president to resign. Some threw stones at police, who responded by firing tear gas and water cannons. At least 130 people were detained across the nation on Saturday, including 42 in Paris, Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said.
Mr. Castaner blamed Marine Le Pen, head of the far-right party National Rally, for urging protesters to head to the Champs Elysées despite an official ban on demonstrations on the avenue.
“What justifies the fact that French people can’t protest on the Champs Elysées when many other gatherings (World Cup, New Year’s Eve…) happened there?” Ms. Le Pen tweeted on Friday. Ms. Le Pen didn’t attend the protests.
Can’t Afford to Eat
‘People are in the red. They can’t afford to eat’
Idir Ghanes, 42, Unemployed computer technician from Paris: We are here to protest against the government because of the rise in taxes [in general], not just petrol taxes, which is the straw that broke the camel’s back. We’ve had enough. We have low salaries and pay too much tax and the combination is creating more and more poverty.
Thousands Protest in Paris
In the Champs-Elysees area, Angry Protesters Start Fires and Roadblocks.
French police fired tear gas and water cannons to disperse violent demonstrators in Paris on Saturday, as thousands gathered in the capital and beyond and staged road blockades to vent anger against rising fuel taxes.
Thousands of police were deployed nationwide to contain the eighth day of deadly demonstrations that started as protests against tax but morphed into a rebuke of President Emmanuel Macron and the perceived elitism of France’s ruling class. Two people have been killed since Nov. 17 in protest-related tragedies.
Police said that dozens of protesters were detained for “throwing projectiles,” among other acts. By nightfall the Champs-Elysees was smoldering and in the Place de la Madeleine, burned scooters lay on the sidewalk like blackened shells.
“It’s going to trigger a civil war and me, like most other citizens, we’re all ready,” said Benjamin Vrignaud, a 21-year-old protester from Chartres.
“They take everything from us. They steal everything from us,” said 21-year-old Laura Cordonnier.
What Socialists Do
Take everything for the alleged good of everyone.
Many if not most of those protesting are socialists who need to look into the mirror to see whom to blame.
Diesel Revolt Flashback
Six days ago I commented Anti-Carbon Revolt: Massive Road Blocks Against Macron’s Diesel Tax
In stunning irony, the French protest against Macron’s diesel tax, while Macron insists the UK abide by climate accord.
The protests have now turned violent.
Reader Comment of the Day
“Funny, the unemployed guy, who lives off other peoples taxes, is bitching about taxes.“
Precisely!
- The socialists want green energy but they don’t want the taxes to pay for it.
- They want free shelter for the homeless but they don’t want to pay for it.
- They want free food, free education, free healthcare, free this, and free that. But they don’t want the taxes to pay for it.
- They want more jobs, but they want more taxes on businesses that create the jobs.
- They vote for socialists guaranteed to raise their taxes, then they bitch about not being able to afford anything.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Do not be fooled, Socialism is alive and well for the top 0.1%, the worlds banks were bailed out in 2008 remember, Socialism for the elite and Capitalism for the rest.
the Iroquois chieftains said it all when they discussed France w/the American founding fathers in Paris in the mid 1700’s.
“’They take everything from us. They steal everything from us,’ said 21-year-old Laura Cordonnier…”
“…of Venezuela”
Nope!
“…of California”
Wrong again!
“…of France.”
Got it!
Raise taxes = mushroom cloud
Cut spending = mushroom cloud
Proof positive that failure is an option.
Or, that a mushroom cloud isn’t necessarily a failure at all, once the alternative is dire enough…..
Failure is guaranteed. The up phase of any cycle is followed by a down phase.
How many bubbles has the FED facilitated? The current one will burst, just as the previous have. It is built into the math.
It didn’t end well for the elites the last time the French people had had enough. This time will be a bit different due to the influx immigration of uneducated and unskilled people. Could be worse.
Nanny state revolt!
This must be fake news! All the Europhiliacs in the US Political Class keep on telling us peons how we should be more like Europe. The Europhiliacs spend all their (our tax?) money buying French wine and German cars and taking vacations in Italy. The only problem there is getting a good night’s sleep in France, what with all the happy people out in the streets singing about how they want to buy the world a Coke.
You can’t have open borders and a welfare state.
At what point between 0% and 100% taxation do you become a slave?
Socialists don’t want socialism to help people and to improve society. Socialists want socialism for power.
The more socialism, the more power.
0.00000000000000000000000000001%, as far as income, sales and other activity taxation is concerned.
Having to report making a glass of lemonade for your neighbor, in exchange for a girl scout cookie, to Leviathan, makes you his slave already. Even in those instance when he, In grand gestured Pancho Villa style, publicly and graciously “allows” you to omit cutting him in on the cookie.
Global warming is in the news all the time. What about low sunspot activity that will bring global cooling in the decades to come? The cooling trend is barely reported by the MSM and largely ignored by politicians.
The alarmists at IPCC just said in their latest report that global warming has to be stopped at 1.5 degrees Celsius quikcly and that the previous warning that warming needs to be stopped at 2 degrees Celsius was wrong and actually 2 degrees Celsius warming would be catastrophic.
Meanwhile according to satellite measurements:
“From February 2016 to February 2018 (the latest month available) global average temperatures dropped 0.56°C”
Read the rest:
Near the end is a beauty of a statement:
“Moreover, the case for global warming does not rely primarily on observed warming; it has models, historical studies and other science behind it. “
And another:
“When they show cooling of any sort—and there have been more cooling months than warming months since anthropogenic warming began—there’s no story.”
And another:
“If the global temperature really showed half a century of uninterrupted warming—with only warming records, no cooling records—then people with nuanced views of plausible future temperatures could be dismissed as deniers. Annual atmospheric CO2 levels have gone up in pretty much a straight line since 1960, if temperatures did the same thing, the link to CO2 would be direct and obvious.”
And another:
“Then there is the danger of backlash. Suppose the next five months are similar to the same five months in 2017 and 2016. At some point the news will leak out that all global warming since 1980 has been wiped out in two and a half years, and that record-setting cooling events went unreported—in fact the headlines while they were occurring referenced warming from other times. Some people could go from uncritical acceptance of steadily rising temperatures to uncritical refusal to accept any warming at all.”
And another:
“Temperatures may climb from here, so these unusual cooling events need not make mainstream news. But unless that happens soon—and remember that would be bad news—climate reporters will have to discuss cooling, which will mean presenting a more complex story than has been typical in the past.”
Read the rest:
10,000 years ago sea levels rose suddenly several meters in just decades:
“Fossilized corals off Texas show that in the past, sea level rose several meters in just decades, probably due to collapsing glaciers”
“New research has provided one of the most detailed looks yet into the patterns of sea-level rise that occurred during the world’s last major warming period, more than 10,000 years ago. The study, published yesterday in Nature Communications, suggests that during this time water rose rapidly, in punctuated bursts, rather than gradually over time. It was likely driven by uneven pulses of meltwater from the world’s collapsing glaciers.”
““It’s not exactly the same situation,” acknowledged André Droxler, a professor of marine geology at Rice University and one of the study’s authors, in an interview with E&E News. Present-day warming is being driven not by natural processes, but by carbon emissions from large-scale burning of fossil fuels, an unprecedented event in the Earth’s history.”
Read the rest:
So natural processes made sea level rise several meters in just decades but this time it is ALL due to CO2 increases?
I am starting to think that there is the possibility that Global Warming later re-branded as Climate Change is the groupthink of all groupthinks based on a hypothesis followed by interpreting the facts to support that hypothesis and not talking about the facts that contradict the prevalent hypothesis.
Scapegoating is one of the oldest plays in the political playbook.
As for the unemployed computer technician, we do not know if he is living off other people’s taxes or living off his own savings. It is quite an assumption that “unemployed” automatically means “receiving taxpayer aid.”
Meanwhile, here in the US we just had midterm elections. In my state and local elections Democrats nearly ran the table. Every government bond question passed; most by 2:1. This happened despite recent examples of extremely wasteful government projects in the news and despite local tax rates moving higher at a concerning rate. I voted against all spending because, as a percentage, I think state and local governments receive enough money and they are very wasteful. My voice is lost in the wind. When I think about it, it occurs to me that two-thirds of my neighbors are on the government payroll in one way or another (they either get paid directly by a government agency or by a private company that is a government contractor). In that context, is it surprising two-thirds of local voters support government getting a pay raise? Hard for me to see how this unsustainable trend gets turned around.
If France and the EU get bad enough soon enough, maybe one good thing to come from it will be more people here in the US will think more carefully about how that unfortunate situation happened. One can hope.
Of course he is getting generous unemployment benefits since it is France the country of always increasing government debt, large benefits and 10% unemployment even in bubble years.
Based on his stated job I think he is getting around 2000 euros a month of the top of my head, that is about 2500 US dollars.
France has a system where one day of work gives you one day of unemployment benefit up to max of 2 years and max of 3 years for older workers.
The unemployment benefit depends on the wage you had when you worked and there is a cap of over 6000 euros a month which is around 7500 US dollars a month in unemployment benefits.
I am guessing that guy gets about 2000 euros a month based on his stated profession.
France’s generous unemployment benefits are the reason you always se so many french people traveling around the world enjoying their 2 year France government and France’s taxpayers funded holiday through unemployment benefits.
Here is a news article about the system:
Here is a property website advertising property telling potential property buyers from abroad how good France’s system is and how it works in detail:
After googling the guy’s name it seems he is an Algerian so he was brought to France or his parents were brought to France through the open borders immigration policies France has had for tens of years for those countries that were previously French colonies.
France has imported as a policy millions upon millions of Africans to France since the 1970’s and then they brought wives and husbands also from home country and made many kids and the 2nd generation also brought husbands and wives from the old country and made many kids.
This guy might be born in France since he was born around 1975-1976 so he could be child of the African immigrants that have streamed to France since early 1970’s and made many many kids because French government pays more benefits for each kid and the more kids you make the more free money you get from French government per kid.
Originally France started importing massive amounts of Africans in the 1970’s because they thought they needed workers for factories but then most of the factories left somewhere or were automated in late 1970’s and during 1980’s and continuing into 1990’s but the people stayed and brought more people from the home country.
France’s political class and elite were scared of being called “racists” if they would have stopped these irresponsible immigration policies towards France’s old colonies so France kept importing more and more Africans even though there were no longer good jobs and in many cases no jobs at all for the people coming.
Same insanity still continues and France is so hysterical that even demographic reports and statistics by ethnicity are FORBIDDEN because “everyone is French”.
Macron is just a continuation of long line of French politicians that have lunatic policies.
Actually the one who tightened things even a bit was previous president Socialist Hollande who in 2015 ordered French border police at the France-Italy border and told them to stop every African migrant at the border and if they sneaked to France to catch them and return them to Italy.
In France one can NOT leave an asylum application at the border because there is a specialized local government office that is the only place to do that and some local government have shut these offices to make sure they get no asylum seekers in their localities.
Trump should consider making the only place one can leave an asylum application some office in Alaska and instruct border patrol just smile when Hondurans and Guatemalans say “asylum” and tell them to go back like France is still under Macron doing to Africans who were saved from Mediterranean by Italy and who try to come to France from Italy which is a SAFE country just like Mexico.
France and Hollande had to act after Italy had saved 170,000 migrants from the Mediterranean sea in 2014 but only registered 70,000 as asylum seekers in Italy and “misplaced” over 100,000 migrants in 2014 many of whom came to live in France especially those who came from African countries whose citizens usually do not get asylum so they just live in the underground economy in France and rent an apartment from another immigrant who already has French residence permit or even a passport but who has moved back to Africa and lives a luxurious life there with France’s welfare benefits and the money they get from secretly renting their apartment to another African who works in underground economy without paying tax.
Those Africans who have landed in Italy but who have likelihood of getting asylum due to weak policies in some countries have gone to those countries like Eritreans to Norway and Denmark and Somalis to Norway, Sweden and Finland for years so Italy’s a-hole behavior against other EU countries under previous Renzi government and governments before that have kept flows of migrants coming until France closing their border with Italy in the summer of 2015 slowed down the flow.
However Hollande still kept loose policies towards those African countries like Algeria who have earlier been France’s colonies so Algerians can just fly to France if they already have relatives there and they jump over some minimal hoops or if they marry another Algerian already living in France.
He is 42 so he is kind of old according to employers preferences in that field so if he has run out of his 2 years of generous unemployment benefits and is on just basic welfare benefits life might be a bit tight for him but that is still enough for apartment in the banlieus aka France’s immigrant ghettos that surround every large French city and he is not starving since even basic benefits can buy enough food but most likely he does not have money to sit at cafes or go for some beers in bars or eat out at French restaurants.
“Same insanity still continues and France is so hysterical that even demographic reports and statistics by ethnicity are FORBIDDEN because “everyone is French”.”
Yes I believe the French census does not break out population statistics by race and ethnicity. I went to Paris a few years ago after not having been for a few decades, and it was pretty shocking. Seems like the city may be 40% black/arab? There were many times I was on the metro and it was all black, not one white person. And this is Europe! Some people who don’t travel much have this illusion from the distant past that Paris is still a place with white French guys in berets running around with baguettes…. Not the case so much, good chance the person selling you a baguette will be black or arab.
Similar deal with London, it is only British “in name”. Nothing about the people or culture there is much British anymore.
“In my state and local elections Democrats nearly ran the table. Every government bond question passed; most by 2:1.”
California? In some races here, it is impossible to vote for other than a democrat as the top two primary challengers are democrat.
On Los Angeles TV, hardly saw an ad for a republican. It seemed Newsom was the only person running for governor.
Bond measures are easy to pass because voters do not bother to think about paying the bonds off. If every bond measure had an incremental increase in the sales tax to cover the cost of the bond, there would be a much lower (near zero) passage rate. In California where I live, voters seem to think someone else will magically pick up the tab.
Socialism: because you would resent being robbed by your neighbour but more than happy to get the government to do it for you without a twinge of conscience.
‘Cash strapped’ = gimme someone else’s money NOW!!
Does that protester fire on the Champs Elysées, violate the Paris Climate Accord?
Good question.
NO it does not since Paris Climate Accord only states that counted CO2 that is released to the air needs to be cut by a lot by France and all Western and Northern EU countries to save the world despite the CO2 cutbacks being so large that they will destroy the countries economies and increase living costs since policies like Macron did with tax increases are expected from all those EU countries so poor will get much poorer in EU and need more welfare which will be paid by getting the governments more and more in debt and also the tax base will be destroyed since CO2 tariffs will make factories uncompetitive.
Random tire burnings in Champs Elysees in the middle of Paris are not in the Paris Climate Accord text.
However in the Paris Climate Accord text is right to China to increase it’s CO2 emissions as much as it wants until 2030 despite China already releasing more CO2 than EU and USA COMBINED and since China’s “cut” is keeping CO2 emissions at 2030 level from then on the incompetently written and stupidly negotiated Paris Climate Accord INCENTIVIZES China to raise their CO2 emissions as high as possible by 2030.
Maybe China will just burn coal in open pits in 2029-2030 and run factories night and day even if there are no products made in them just to get a nice CO2 buffer so they never have to actually cut anything if they boost their CO2 emissions as high as possible before their “cut”.
Good for the protesters. I love a spirited protest. The hell with the socialists.
I think Thomas Piketty needs to do a rewrite.
Piketty’s book was tedious waffle. I think people said it was great because they had read a book review that said it was great.
I even suspect some of the reviewers copied other reviewers and had just skimmed the book.
Excellent comment by Shamrock. I added an addendum.
Funny, the unemployed guy, who lives off other peoples taxes, is bitching about taxes.
Tax raised to help encourage private equity out of London as taxes on them are aimed to be reduced to encourage moves. They need to make up the difference.
Macron is favouring capital over labour at just the WRONG TIME. When people understand fully its not all about climate there will be a backlash.
Even if he succeeds, at what price?
He’s a banker boy, never had a proper job and out of touch. He forgets the less well off have votes too. “Let them drive Ev’s.”
“…not all about climate…”
0% about climate. 100% about money & political power.
FTFY